I will keep this short. I hate emails. I receive tons. Emails are an evil necessity. I subscribed to receive notifications of your new posts by email. I love your posts, they make me smile. I still hate email. Thanks for the smiles.

I visited that same art show in Birmingham…his paintings do depict the happier side of life. As I read this story, I realized that Sean Dietrich is the “Norman Rockwell of words.” Thank you for continuing Norman’s legacy of presenting what is good and happier in everyday life.

I also visited that same exhibit in Birmingham with my husband. We’re not art patrons but we certainly enjoyed that exhibit. Looking at his work was much like watching life at it’s finest, you just couldn’t get enough because each said so much.

I agree with Judy in that Sean of the South paints in our minds the details of moments and people that reveal the goodness and richness there are people. It’s my daily devotional…along with a few other folks that I’ve shared him with 😉

Mine too Maxine….he is the Steve Hartman of CBS News “on the road” ! Going around this great country to find “good people, doing good things, for others!” I actually read Sean’s posts( if they’re post early) before my meditations on occasion. He is “the best”!

Signs from above…….well, you bet cha there are. I hear my parents at time when I speak. Just the other day I mentioned “spit up” on a social media in reference to what a certain food would make me do. A person stated, “I haven’t heard that term since my grandmother was living.” Hmmm, Mother would always say that. She felt other terms were too harsh, especially the one which starts with a “P”. Daddy had had an extensive vocabulary. I hear him when I use some of those words. Yep, signs from above do exist.

I love old things too. Flea markets and antique stores, roadside yard sales and thrift stores. Not because anybody taught me any value in old things, but because I like to think about who may have touched those things, what their lives were like, the people who loved them. And there is longevity in old things. Not like today’s things, made to be replaced in a week, but made to last. You are an old soul and made to last.

What a lovely column today. I know you are a Southern man and seem to stay mainly in the South but if you ever get the chance to visit “ Norm’s “ studio in Stockbridge, Massachusetts….His paints are right where he left them and you can really feel his presence. I have loved his work since I saw his “Four Freedoms“ -the dad standing over his sleeping children holding a newspaper with a dire headline …that Dad resembles my own Dad so much…
Bless you Sean….

When you do experience “that sign from above”, you never forget it. You KNOW there is a God! So glad you had your experience and I’m quite sure you’ve had more. You seem to be someone who looks for them.

I definitely believe in signs from above! About a year and a half ago, my brother-in-law died after suffering from Parkinson’s disease for about 10 years. The day of his funeral, his granddaughter (who was 8) asked her mom (his daughter) if we would be going “to the yard or back to that other place” (cemetery or funeral home.) My niece explained that we would go to the funeral home first and then to the cemetery. She asked about Pop. Her mom explained he would be taken to the cemetery too. In her 8-year-old innocence, she asked, “In the back of Daddy’s truck?” This made us all chuckle.The next day I saw a post of Facebook of a casket in the back of a pick-up truck, and I burst into laughter because I knew that was a sign from Danny saying all was good. Only someone with his sense of humor would have sent that particular sign.

I saw the “Norman Rockwell” exhibit in Washingto in DC and felt the same way. I could have spent more time taking in the beauty around us as he saw it. I too believe in the little signs and sometimes they speak to me from your column. On those day I thank you.

My grandmother died when I was about 20 and it was absolutely devastating to me. We were at the cemetery and I was crying so hard I thought they were going to have to carry me to the car. All of a sudden I saw something that floored me. There were three butterflies that went by, two beautiful ones and one that flew crooked dropping and wavering in the air as it went by. It was a huge big glaring sign there in the cemetery where we were burying my grandmother across from her identical twin and that twins husband, who had limped since he was a child from the polio that twisted his leg. There is no doubt that God is there and that love never ends.

I also have a Norman Rockwell compilation book, Sean. Every once in awhile, I pull it out and look at life through Mr. Rockwell’s eyes. And that is a very good thing! My Granny Viola used to keep an old coffee pot on the back burner of her stove, too. I loved looking at it, when I walked into her country kitchen. She also had one of those pretty clocks with a glass dome, that sat on the fireplace mantel. I would sit for hours, just watching the light reflect from the glass. Old things are wonderful. Now I am turning into an old thing, myself! Thanks for sharing your memories. They nudged mine out of the back corner of my mind!

Norman Rockwell saw things the way they were supposed to be and he once said. “ All I need to paint is an old man, a child and a dog “
I hope that one day Sean, you take a trip to Stockbridge, MA where “Old Norm” lived and painted. His home has been preserved and his paints are right there where he left them. His studio is well worth the trip.He used local townspeople for his subjects…..
As far as signs…..I see them almost every day and when you really look for them you realize there is no such thing as coincidences….the synchronicity of things is unmistakable.
A quick one – my Aunt Connie never forgot my birthday – 4 months after she passed, I received a dollar bill as change with the name Connie written across it in black bold letters on my actual birthday…..
Of all the dollar bills in circulation. 365 days in the year. How many names are there ?
You just have to believe.
Thanks, as always for your writings….

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Sean Dietrich

Sean Dietrich is a columnist, and novelist, known for his commentary on life in the American South. His work has appeared in Southern Living, The Tallahassee Democrat, Good Grit, South Magazine, Alabama Living, the Birmingham News, Thom Magazine, The Mobile Press Register, and he has authored seven books.